Receive Me Falling (25 page)

           
Cecil would be occupied with the
fire for hours; therefore, Catherine had some freedom.
  
She knew that the wisest choice would be to
enter the house immediately, but the lure of the action was too much for her to
ignore.
 
Creeping through the tangled forest
along the left side of the house, Catherine began to make her way toward the
sugar buildings.

           
An orange glow rose up over the tree
tops amidst great bellowing gasps of black smoke, and the shouts and calls of
the men punctuated the stillness of the night.
 
Catherine stole along the grounds creeping closer and closer to a
clearing that would give her visual access to the fire, while still concealing
her form.
 

           
She stumbled rather suddenly upon
the clearing, and had to jump back into the shadows of the jungle to avoid
exposure.
 
Her eyes felt the sting of the
smoke and she had to suppress her coughing as she gazed upon the shocking
inferno.

           
Rising to the sky in a monumental
pyre were the flames that had engulfed the heart of the Hall plantation.
 
In spite of the dark forms scurrying around
to put out the fire, it was apparent that all was lost.
 
Catherine could see that controlling the
blaze and keeping it from touching the surrounding trees was the only possible
course of action that remained.
  
She
began to tremble as she realized that the Halls would be ruined. The cost of
purchasing and building new sugar manufacturing equipment would be exorbitant,
and Catherine knew from her conversations with Cecil that the Halls were
already in debt to the Crown for unpaid loans.
 

           
The flames were hypnotic, and
Catherine lost track of time as she stared into the hellish conflagration.
 
A figure hurrying toward the house, however,
roused her from her trance and sent her scurrying back through the
shadows.
 
She reached the front of the
house, let herself in the front door, and followed the glow of the candlelight
to the parlor, where she found Mrs. Hall and her daughters hysterical over the
tragedy.
 
Mrs. Hall rose from the settee
where she had been clutching her daughters as Catherine entered the room.

“Oh, Catherine, how did you manage to come here
under such dangerous and horrible circumstances?”

           
“I insisted that I come to unburden
you and your daughters, and keep safe myself.”

           
“How could you possibly be safe
here?
 
We’ve been ruined!”

           
Mrs. Hall began weeping again and
returned to her place of mourning.
 

           
“All the men from our plantations
are here putting out the blaze,” said Catherine.
 
“It’s better if we all stay together.”

           
Heavy boots thudding down the
gallery caused the women to turn toward the door.
 
Edward Ewing strode in, covered in sweat and
streaks of ashes.
 

           
“We are doing all we can, Mrs.
Hall.
 
I was sent to check up on you and
make sure you were safe.”

           
Edward looked startled to see
Catherine sitting in the parlor, and smoothed his hair and shirt.

           
“Miss Dall, I must assume your
father knows that you are here.”

           
“He insisted I come for my safety
and for the comfort of the Hall women.”

           
“An excellent idea.
 
I do not mean to scare you, but this fire was
most likely the work of vandals displeased with the recent rulings of the
Council.
 
When we find out who did this,
there will be severe retribution.
 
In the
mean time, it is best that you are not alone.”

           
Mr. Hall soon entered the room
looking dumbfounded and numb with exhaustion.
 
Catherine solicited the two Miss Halls to help her procure water, bread,
and towels for the men as they began to enter the house.
 
All were worn, weary, and blackened from the
fire.
 

Catherine busied herself distributing water and
towels to the men, and soon found that her assistance was needed in tending to
several injuries.
 
By that time, a small
group of slave women had replaced the Miss Halls and Catherine serving
refreshments.
 
Catherine had two slaves
fetch the plants needed for the scrapes and burns suffered by the men.
 
As she bandaged Edward’s forearm, he looked
searchingly into her face.

           
“You are too kind,” he said.

           
“It is nothing.”

           
“Everything has been destroyed,”
Edward whispered.
 
“The Halls are
ruined.”

           
She stopped working and looked at
Edward’s face.
 

           
“What will they do?” she asked.

           
“The only thing they can do is
return to England.
 
Mr. Hall’s debts will cause his land to be
seized and sold.
 
They will become
paupers.”

           
Catherine finished bandaging Edward’s
burn and looked at the Halls.
 
The women
wept as Mr. Hall stared at the parlor floor.

           
“There has been talk among the men
that this may be the work of abolitionists.”

           
Catherine snapped her face back to
Edward’s.
 

           
“What do you mean?”

           
“The Quakers and Methodists on the
island have been rounding up small groups of black-loving fools.
 
Some are militant in their opposition to
slavery.”

           
“Surely the religious would not
perform so violent an act to further their cause.”

           
“Throughout history it has always
been the religious most violent in furthering their causes.
 
Besides, they are not the only
abolitionists.
 
There are many involved
in secret groups.”

           
Catherine finished bandaging
Edward’s arm in silence and then traveled with two of the Hall slaves to tend
to the injured slaves down by the smoldering mills.
 
Three of the Hall slaves had died from smoke
and many others were injured from their efforts.
 
Catherine saw the irony in these people
working so hard to save the family who enslaved them.
 
It sickened her.
 

After a short time Cecil sent for Catherine and
told her that it was time to return to Eden.
 
She checked on the men back at the
plantation, and then set out for home.
      
Cecil and Catherine did not speak on the ride home, and proceeded upstairs
once they arrived at Eden.
 
Cecil kissed Catherine’s forehead, and
trudged to his chambers, leaving her standing in silence at the top of the
great staircase, looking down into the darkness, and turning over all she had
seen that night.

The
flames danced along the walls and flickered over the faces of James, Albert,
Jonas, and several Quakers.
 
Each time
the door opened on its salt-rusted hinges, James looked at it, hoping to see
Catherine. He knew his hopes were ridiculous—it would be unspeakably dangerous
for a lady to travel at night to meet with men who were practically strangers
for a cause she was just beginning to embrace.
 
Still, though, Catherine had an adventurous spirit, and seemed intrigued
by the meeting when she had spoken with James at the ball.

           
James also turned over the
possibility of betrayal.
 
Catherine could
tell her father about the meeting and have the Silwells run off the island, or
worse.
 
The men on the largest
plantations were often inebriated and armed—a deadly combination.
 
Albert’s faith in Catherine, however, was
what had led James to tell her of the meeting, and put his trust in her.
 
Albert was seldom wrong about the character
of others, so James allowed that knowledge to quiet his mind and put his
confidence in Catherine.
 
Her support
could provide valuable testimony in London
if she would cooperate.
 

           
But the meeting passed, and she did
not come.

Unable
to sleep from the evening’s occurrences and her troubling thoughts, Catherine
slipped from her bed, and moved through the darkness to her window.
 
She opened the shutters, sat on the window
sill, and stared out into the blackness, searching for the ocean.
 
  
In
her hand she folded and refolded the slip of paper inviting her to the
abolitionist meeting earlier that evening.

1:00 AM
 
Bath Hotel
 
Room 10

James’
fine penmanship was slightly blurred by the moisture of the island air, and the
paper was growing brittle from Catherine’s frequent handling.
 

           
It did not seem possible that James
and his father would orchestrate so violent and sudden an attack against her
neighbor, but the evidence was there—the charred remains of the nucleus of the
Hall plantation were smoldering in an ashy heap on the same night that the
meeting had taken place.

           
Catherine felt her fear turn to
anger.
 
Was this a warning to her?
 
Was James putting on a gentlemanly façade to
conceal the true reason behind his visit to the island?

England
could certainly receive payment for her debts a
lot sooner if the plantations were snuffed out by fires, rather than shut down
by the long and tedious process of the law.

           
But somehow, Catherine doubted her
ponderings.
 
It seemed much more likely
that a small neighboring planter took matters into his own hands to sabotage
those bullying him; and Catherine found that she could not entirely fault
him.
 

           
Exhaustion stole over her, and
Catherine moved back to her bed.
 
Sleep
came much easier than she had anticipated, and she passed out before she managed
to pull up the quilt.